Company Hired to Plan the Future of the Old BAE Site

Elan Planning, Design and Landscape Architecture of Saratoga Springs is being paid with a $200,000 federal grant to figure out what to do with the former BAE Systems site in Westover that was vacated and cleared following the 2011 flood.

“The Agency” has announced the hiring of the company to do a feasibility study on the 27-acre site.

Lisa Nagel, principal with Elan, calls the site on Main Street just west of Johnson City “a blank canvas” with the firm looking to make the site attractive to a developer.

Photo: Bob Joseph/WNBF News

Before a developer is wooed to the location, there has to be work for mitigating potential future flooding. Nagel says they will be looking at just where the water came from during the historic floods of 2006 and the 2011 flood that ultimately left the location an empty lot after serving as a U.S. Airforce manufacturing facility for decades. The Broome County Industrial Development Agency, now known simply as “The Agency”, currently holds ownership of the property.

Elan will also be examining what would work well at the site near both Binghamton University’s Vestal campus and the soon to be opened Pharmacy School in Johnson City with easy access to Route 17 and Interstates 81 and 86 and the costs of making the site shovel-ready for development.